Posted
by
CmdrTacoon Sunday June 04, 2006 @11:17AM
from the now-thats-a-strange-idea dept.

AngryNick writes "The Union of Concerned Scientists has announced a cartoon contest for amateur and professional artists.
'The absurdity of political interference in science is fertile ground for satire,' said Dr. Francesca Grifo, Director of the UCS Scientific Integrity Program. 'We hope these contests encourage amateur and professional cartoonists alike to express concern--through humor and art--about the impact of the abuse of science on our safety, health and environment.'
A celebrity judge panel will select twelve finalists and the public will then choose the Grand Prize winner. The winner will receive a host of prizes, including $500 and an all-expenses-paid trip to have lunch with the celebrity judge of his or her choice.
You can read Contest details, sample topics and the list of celebrity judges."

If we're talking political abuse-of-science, can I link to this essay by Michael Crichton [michaelcrichton.com] about "environmentalism as religion" just to remind everyone that things like this cut both ways?

Actually, most bacteria resistant to antibiotics became that way through no small part by patient non-compliance. The too many people see the directions to finish all the medication in the bottle, but pay it no heed. Instead, they stop taking their prescriptions when they feel better. Unfortunately, feeling better and being infection free are two very different conditions. When a person feels better it is likely that that person just has a level of infection that has no ill effect on the body. Unfortun

Are you serious? There is no question that the U.S. Ban on DDT has resulted in supply shortages such that millions of Africans and South Americans are dying each year from malaria. This site [fightingmalaria.org] and this reference at the the CDC [cdc.gov] are good places to start.

What is worse is that the philisophical routes of this ban were explicitly anti-human. Rachel Carson barely mentioned any negative impact on humans in 'Silent Spring'. Certainly, there were no such studies at the time (and studies since then have shown 0 ill effects to humans). Carson's main complaint was that DDT weakened the shells of bird eggs, thereby disrupting their cycle. This too has been disproven.

So, we have essentially sacrificed the lives of millions of humans in the name of speculation regarding the potential damage to birds! If that's not religion, I don't know what is.

The hallmarks of dishonet argument on DDT are as follows:1. Accuse DDT regulation of being motivated to protect birds for their own sake. Do not mention that birds are the primary preditors of malaria-carrying insects.

2. Assume that the effects of DDT use are stable; do not assume that insects will become resistant.

3. Assume that the number of infections prevented similarly follows a constant rate ad infinitum.

The argument FOR banning DDT that I've always heard was the the benefits of DDT are strong at firs

This posting continues to repeat common distortions and false
dichotomies about DDT, malaria, and the environment.

The use of DDT to prevent malaria is not an environmental
issue. The amounts used are tiny when compared to what
was used in agriculture.

Millions of tons of DDT were applied agriculturally,
resulting in the wide-spreed environmental contamination
and non-consented exposure of humans. This also resulted
in the evolution of strains of DDT-resistant mosquitoes,
making DDT less effective in malaria control.

A large about of the agricultural use in developed
countries was to produce cheaper cotton. Yet this misuse
that lead to the ban on the agricultural never seems to be
criticized by the so-called DDT defenders.

The weakening of egg shells of birds by the DDT metabolite
DDE has not been disproved.

The implication that individuals who are concerned about
the environment and other species are not concerned about
people in third world countries. There are extremists in
every corner, but as a rule, no evidence ever presented to
back this up.

Personally, I have had malaria while in a developing
country, with out access to western medical facilities. I
have a greater appreciation than most of the direct
affects of malaria.

Other replies point out some of the problems with your reasoning. But for a different perspective: My wife is Nigerian (just became a US citizen a few years ago). She had malaria as a child, and so did most of her family. And she doesn't see why this is such a big deal.

Malaria is not a terrible scourge that puts people in fear of their lives. It is a common disease that, much like the flu, is unlikely to be fatal except in those who were already ill or infirm. Those deaths are still sad and should be prev

The scientists aren't abusing anything. The way the theme of this contest cuts both ways is that both politicians in power and hippies in the street distort or misrepresent science to further their own political agenda.

Heck, if we're talking abuse of science, I can't think of any better subject to discuss than the author of Andromeda Strain, Prey, and State of Fear. The man's been mangling science for years and then making his books look better by tossing a gratuitous biblography of all the papers he supposedly read to justify his plots. (Alien crystal viruses, grey goo, and local cooling disproving global warming, oh my!)

The essay you link is nothing but an attack on the argument by attacking the source of the argument as being from zealots. He accuses the environmental movement of being responsible for massive deaths, and claims that they're distorting facts without backing any of it up with "facts" of his own -- except for "facts" like the harmlessness of second-hand smoke. Crichton's a loon and an asshole for making that last argument in particular, but the bulk of the essay argument is that environmentalists are wrong in their assertions (without any justification of why) and thus religious nuts for asserting something that his holiness Crichton declares to be wrong. (Oh, he could cite mainstream articles, but you wouldn't believe him anyway, so why back up his bald-faced lies?)

He attacks environmentalists as being the same as people who romanticize primativism, use errors on predictions of a socially affected phenomena like population growth show that scientists who care about the environment can't be trusted. He claims that DDT is harmless because it's not a carcinogenic (when it's the liver, immune, and nervous toxicity that actually caused it to be banned). He states that we can't totally roll back carbon emissions without fusion technology, so it's a waste of time to bother reducing them in the meantime. He falls back on the old saw of the environment being a complex system that's hard to understand as justification for not erring on the side of safety.

His speech is nothing but a litany of half-truths, distortions, unbacked assertions, and ad hominem attacks. So, yes, let's start our discussion of abuse of science with a discussion of Crichton. It's only appropriate.

He falls back on the old saw of the environment being a complex system that's hard to understand as justification for not erring on the side of safety.

You had me interested until that point. Come on, that's just a little too obviously biased to let slide - side of safety for whom? Future generations who might be affected? Or current generations whose economic interests *will* be significantly affected?

I'm not arguing against the theory of global warming, but merely stating that "playing it safe" is an ar

Regardless of the quality of science in his writings, the interesting thing for me was the turnaround in perception of him. For years, I thought a number of his stories and the films made of them were quite good, but the science was iffy at best. Even so, he seemed to be well thought of as putting forward "cautionary tales" highlighting the hubris of science, scientists and capitalists who myopically care for nothing but their own ends (the owner in the book version of Jurassic Park for example).Now that he

So, after all that reactionary vitriol, do you have any actual counterarguments against hispoint that environmentalism has become an urban religion? Or are you just hating on someone who disagrees with you? You sound like the same reactionary loons who attacked the author of The Skeptical Environmentalist, because he dared speak out against the hegemony of thinking going on in the environmentalist movement.Frankly, Crichton makes a lot of very valid points, particularly about man's ingrained rush to craf

If we're talking abuse of science, I can't think of any better subject to discuss than the author of Andromeda Strain, Prey, and State of Fear... Michael Crichton doesn't know what he's talking about.

Here here to that! Micahel Crichton's works are disturbingly close to science, without actually being accurate (that is the danger - that they are confused with science by young/uneducated minds).

The essay you link is nothing but an attack on the argument by attacking the source of the argument as being from zealots. He accuses the environmental movement of being responsible for massive deaths.

Ad hominem attacks are highly effective. Why is this? Is it a quirk of human nature "I hate this guy so I don't listen to anything he says," or is it actually rational? Think about this for a moment:

If one takes a Bayesian view of probability [wikipedia.org] (probability represents one's degree of belief in a proposition, not a frequency of occurrance), then if one is a rational Bayesian agent, one must incorporate all "relevant" information when ascertaining the belief of a hypothesis, through the chaining of probabilities. Starting with a prior on a statement (unfortunately what prior to choose is often unclear, and is perhaps even arbitrary), one modifies the belief by multiplying by conditional probabilities as gathered by evidence.

One can easily make the claim (the "proof" for this shall be left as an exercise to the reader) that given the sum of experiences one has collected over their lifetime, (direct experience or transitive experience through discussion, books, and other media) one can infer that there is indeed a conditional probability connecting the probability that entity A is a "zealot" and that information from entity A is incorrect.

Bayesian reasoning/inference differs significantly from "pure" boolean reasoning in that it captures this information in a way tha tis actually useful in real life. For instance, the statement "if someone is pointing a gun at you, they will kill you" is obviously false under boolean logic systems, however in real life it is prudent to infer that it is likely enough that htey will kill you that you should take it into account in your planning process. Similarly with the "ad hominem" attacks. The following statements are all valid in a Bayesian framework (when one takes into account the independence of these propositions from other information known about entity A):

Entity A is a zealot/crackpot, therefore assertion X is more likely to be incorrect.

Entity A is a well respected, unbiased source, therefore assertion X is likely to be correct.

Assertion X is known to conflict with deep laws of science/politics, or is a minority viewpoint which is considered to be "fringe thinking"/"crackpottery"/un-preferred worldview (i.e. over-unity devices, fascism, tinfoil-hat), therefore Entity A is likely to be an untrustworthy source

Assertion X, Y, Z, etc have proven to be correct and are in-line with generally accepted theory, therefore Entity A is more likely to be a trustworthy source.

All of these statements are fairly vague (I'm sure one can find a far more rigorous discussion of this somewhere online), however I trust you can see that independent of all other information on Entity A these statements are correct.

That leads me to conclude (in an albeit simplified fashion) that because information on a subject/individual/particular point is highly limited (indeed, with things like global warming, etc, even having a PhD in the field is only a reasonable start, not a comprehensive, authoritative educaiton), one must consider all information about an argument (and weight it according to statistical correlation) when one makes an inference (once again assuming one is a Bayesian, which is a strong assumption, but definitely closer to human reasoning under uncertainty than pure boolean logic, or

Or possibly accurate? I have to admit to being underwhelmed by Mr. Crichton. He seems to be totally unconcerned with truth in the pursuit of ??? At one point I thought it was either artistic or commercial success, but currently a political agenda appears more likely. (Of course, there's no reason it couldn't be some combination of the suspects.) However, the common element is a disregard of the truth.That said, Andromeda Strain was an exciting movie, and I enjoyed it. I *never* thought it would be used

The toxicity studies were done on animals. You're right that human studies haven't been conclusive. It was in fact banned because of its effects on animals, particularly eggshells. I don't know why I trimmed that part when hastily rearranging the post as I was writing it, and it does come off as saying something false. My bad.

from an objective standpoint, who would you rather win the debate?the way i see it.. if we are not causing global warming, but take environmental precautions assuming we were, there is no harm in that. Every environmental measure taken so far has had little effect on profit margins, and increased the overall quality of life in developed nations.

this is much like putting a seatbelt on when you drive. while there is no guarantee that you will hit someone head on and be tossed through your windshield, I imagi

Actually I think that is their point. The pro-business politicians on one side and the eco-freaks on the other each with their own "experts" with the actually science being not some where in the middle, but on the other side of town.

The scientists want the science to be the validator, not data being warped or cherry picked to support a politcal bent.

The contest is based on political interference. The people you're attacking (environmentalist hippies) misuse/misinterpret scientific findings to fit to their vision of the world. The people they're aiming at attack well establish science by cutting funding, exploiting government, "refuting" science (often using ad hominem attacks), manipulating the general public's understanding of the subject, etc. That's interfering.

I worked at N.I.H (National Institutes of Health) in Washington, D.C. for 4 years doing research and let me tell you - scientists love cartoons! - everyones lab door had four or five cartoons on it (usually The Farside). They can also be pretty blunt and to the point. I'm pretty sure some of these cartoons will ruffle some feather quite a bit, which is what we need I guess. Unfortunatley, media portrayal of scientists is not always ideal, and may further serve to spread the barrier between rational thought and the great number of uneducated people who may be religious/creationists. I happen to be Catholic and couldn't be happier on the Vaticans stance that evolution is a valid scientific theory, and that the earth isn't 6,000 years old.

Please no flame wars about the old churches stance on celestial mechanics - we've all seen it before, no need to bring it up and get side tracked. We are talking about todays political climate.

And please let's not limit this discussion to evolution and creationists - there's been a great deal of interference on the topic of global warming. The old Republican party stance that it's not occurring has been disproven by the vast majority of atmospheric/climatologists scientists, and have shown it to be a fact. I hate that because Al Gore (A Democrat) is pro-environment, that many Republicans feel that they have to take an opposing viewpoint - what gives!? Yes, I'm sure the Dems do the same with other issues, but we are talking about science here, so let's keep our egos and passions aside and behave like rational thinkers.

Right.... the republicans are raping the environment because they want to stick it to the democrats. It has NOTHING to do with the millions of campaign dollars contributed by companies that profit from the destruction of the planet.

FWIW, I don't think that (1) global warming has definitively been established, and (2) that there is anything even approaching a definitive establishment as to cause.

Me, I do believe it's happening--but that human activity has absolutely nothing to do with it. Rather, it's part of the natural cycle that has been in effect since before there WERE human beings on earth.

The notion that it is caused by what puny humans can do is just laughable. One has only to look at the phenomenon of Mt. Pinatubo and Mt. St.

"The notion that it is caused by what puny humans can do is just laughable."

Why is it that human beings (all 6+ billion of us) suddenly become puny and insignificant when, and only when, global warming is mentioned?

"One has only to look at the phenomenon of Mt. Pinatubo and Mt. St. Helens--both of which put more particulates into the atmosphere in DAYS than humans have throughout their history--to realize the earth is a self-regulating system."

Our best farmlands are 200-700m above sea level. Even the most extreme of global warming cases put that above water.

And once sea level rises, and weather systems move as a result of increased heat, are those still going to be your best farmlands ? Or are they going to dry up and become deserts ?

And what will you do if, say, the best farmlands of China turn out to be too low and are buried underwater ? Do you think that the chinese are going to simply starve silently, or are they going to try to take yours ?

I see my original post was modded Overrated. I guess the pro-industry astroturfers are out again tonight. Makes me wonder if Slashdot was given any "donations" to make the two mods unmetamoderable...

There is significant evidence for global warming, but less showing that it is caused by people. It seems to me that scientists are politically pressured to support global warming, just like evolution (Which I don't necessarily disagree with, but I doubt many scientific organizations would give support to a scientist with another theory, even if it wasn't in any way similar to intelligent design.).

I've been thinking about whether evolution is a scientific theory lately. Maybe it's that I'm insufficiently imaginative, or maybe that biologists are less inclined to Popperian philosophies of science than people from a physical science background, but I can't see how theories about speciation over millions of years could be either falsified or tested repeatedly. In what sense, then, are they scientific?

but I can't see how theories about speciation over millions of years could be either falsified or tested repeatedly. In what sense, then, are they scientific? - well, we actually observe speciation happenning in real life, and not only in bacteria.In abalone for example, we have observed actual speciation taking place. We understand exactly HOW it happens in them as well. Speciation in this case involves a population splitting into two population and genetically drifting from each other, so that they can'

Making your theory fit with recorded data is a good way to come up with it, but at some point you need to make a prediction about an unknown outcome and see if that matches. If you only have to match the past, then the people who analyze Nostradamus's writings are just as much scientists as anyone else.

Not exactly. An experiment means that you are setting the conditions, predict a possible outcome out of your theory and then perform the experiment, measure the results and compare them with your predictions. That doesn't mean that everything you are measuring later is created during the experiment. It just means that it was unknown beforehand.So one of the predictions of evolution theory was that birds and recent reptiles have a common ancestor, and thus there has to have been an animal with a mixed patter

There are some people who study science just to dig up facts that support their position, whether it is valid or not.

Doesn't matter what the issue is, there's always going to be at least one person who will stand directly opposite the facts and yell "You're wrong", if for no other reason than to get attention &/or be difficult.

What are you talking about exactly? UCS's opposition to the Reagan Strategic Defense Initiative on scientific grounds? That hardly amounts to support of Soviet geopolitical aims, no matter how you slice it. Perhaps I am ignorant of something else? if so, please enlighten me; otherwise I think the assertion is nonsense.

When I read the New Testament, one thing that really stands out to me is the emphasis Jesus placed on always asking questions. He never told his followers to obey him obediently. He wanted them to question his actions and words. He wanted them to think for themselves, and analyze the world around them, for themselves. That's the very essence of science: understanding nature via observation and experimentation.

A common theme throughout the Gospels is somebody asking Jesus a question, and Jesus telling them to look. Sometimes they would have to look inside themselves, but other times they were told to look at the world around them. They could find the answers there. All they had to do was look.

Frankly, we don't need comics to prove wrong those Republicans, neoconservatives, evangelists, etc., who have perverted the teachings of Christ. As Christ taught us to do, all we need to do is look! We can look for ourselves at his very teachings just to see how perverted some people's interpretations of them are. And we can use his wisdom in our pursuit of science. As scientists, we always need to be continuously observing, experimenting, and otherwise understanding the world around us. That's exactly what Jesus encouraged his followers to do.

He wanted them to question his actions and words. He wanted them to think for themselves, and analyze the world around them, for themselves.

Jesus was also very anti-theocracy and wanted people to develop their own, individual spirituality and not to repeat hymns by rote. He said his followers should just speak to God and mumbled off the Lord's Prayer on the spot as an example of how to speak to a diety.

It's funny how his message was perverted by those who stood to gain from said perversion. Well, actually

When I read the New Testament, one thing that really stands out to me is the emphasis Jesus placed on always asking questions. He never told his followers to obey him obediently. He wanted them to question his actions and words.

Mark 10:2-12: "And the Pharisees came to him, and asked him, Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife? tempting him. And he answered and said unto them, What did Moses command you? And they said, Moses suffered to write a bill of divorcement, and to put her away. And Jesus answered and said unto them, For the hardness of your heart he wrote you this precept. But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female. For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife; And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder. And in the house his disciples asked him again of the same matter. And he saith unto them, Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, committeth adultery against her. And if a woman shall put away her husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery."

There is no questioning nor observation nor experiment here. There is a bald pronouncement: divorce is forbidden (there is a hotly contested description of the same exchange in Matthew that may permit divorce on some grounds if we could only figure out how to translate the Greek word "pornei" unambiguously.)

The key to this passage is the question of scriptural authority vs the authority of Christ. Jesus is saying that even though the scriptures permit divorce, God doesn't approve of it and the time has come to end it. Jesus is claiming arbitrarily and without a shred of empirical evidence that God wants married people to stay that way. Period. He does not mention social ills or practical problems. He simply invokes what God wants. This why Christianity is religion, not science.

There is no practical way within the Christian framework to challenge Jesus' flat-out prohibition on divorce. To do so you either have to avail yourself of Matthew's ambiguous loophole, or you have to deny the validity of Christ's words in this instance, possibly invoking the fact that we know prohibiting divorce can lead to various social ills, the exploitation and/or battering of spouses, etc, and Jesus was clearly against that kind of thing.

But once you have done that you are well on your way down the interpretive slippery slope that leads to secular humanism. You'll find lots of friendly people ready to greet you with open arms when you reach the bottom!

...for a contest that could potentially draw an entry from virtually every scientist, academic, researcher, or otherwise pro-understanding individual in the United States. The potential exists for a few tens of millions of entries, especially given the current disillusionment.

eg: NASA is currently cutting back or eliminating many science missions in order to pay for the next-gen shuttle, which assumes Congress won't cut NASA's budget over the next ten years -and- there are no cost overruns anywhere, according to the New Scientist.

eg: The US has spent a miniscule fraction of what it pledged and committed in the fight against bird flu, according to the World Bank. Whether an epidemic ever occurs is irrelevant in this. What matters is that even hard-nosed financial institutions are getting concerned. When the economists think Government is spending too little, it's time to be worried.

(I'm not singling out the US because it's particularly bad amongst nations - it actually does better than most - but because that's what the contest is about. Had this been an international contest, I'm sure I could find alarming attitudes in every civilized nation on the planet. It wasn't that long ago that the South African Health Minister promoted garlic as a cure for AIDS. Although I suppose there might be a lot of vampires in South African politics.)

I just don't know how this project can possibly reach its true potential with such limited backing. Most who could enter a truly biting cartoon won't be bothered, because there won't be any perceived value. If getting into the final rounds constituted a publication in a peer-reviewed forum, then perhaps there would be more interest. Money from pro-science organizations towards prizes would have been good, too.

For those on Slashdot with no artistic talents - enter anyway. Most scientists can't draw worth a damn, so it'll be purely down to the ideas in the cartoon anyway. Besides, there are valid reasons for believing the readers here have a broader understanding of the state of science and the attitudes around it - those focused totally on their subject won't have time to read up on anything much outside of their speciality and so won't be able to so easily draw on attitudes and perceptions that are universal.

Devil holding up a sign, "My gandpa ain't no monkey!" in a group of evolution protestors. One guys turns and says, "YOU'RE here too?" And the devil replys, "What? And let even MORE people see how brilliant he can be?"

Man, it took me a bit to understand that, but that's about exactly right. I believe in God -and- evolution, and don't understand how people can flat refuse to believe God is powerful enough to use evolution as his tool.

... or for that matter, that even if we have the best of evidence that evolution did happen, that an omnipotent God still could have created what we have right now yesterday and your very memories could be a figment of his imagination.

That said, since its an unprovable tenet, we may as well do the research anyway:)

A) The god that creates everything in on feel swoop 6000, filles with incosistancies and plotholes and has to step in every so often to adjust settings here and there.

B) The one who can plan out events billions of years in advance, making everything fit so perfectly together, using simple rules that are capable of fractal growth into marvelously complex systems that continue to run flawlessly for millions of years without intervention?

In a head to head battle, I have a feeling that God B will have figured out how to win before the fight even begins.

How about a cartoon showing how genes sometimes mutate randomly and allow creation of different species (an ape becomes a man.) And then another cartoon showing that a scientist modifies a gene by design to enhance some specific quality of an organism (a scientologist trying to become a rationalist.) A signature underneath this: 'Evolution: 4*10^9 years. Intelligent design: 40 years, so this may take a while.'

For all this discussion has focused on the "debate" about global warming, if you think that political interference is limited to environmental science, you're missing a very, very big picture.

Let me start off by saying that scientific advancement is not a left-right issue, and should never be viewed through the narrow prism of party politics. However, the United States has fallen into a (man-made) rut of EVERYTHING being split down partisan lines (even national security, even voting integrity, even scientific research) so that is the playing field we are on, whether we like it or not. Wedge politics infect every issue now.

Under this administration, the religious right has exerted undue influence over decisions ranging from:

And without going on a daylong linkhunt, they are passing bad information about condom effectiveness, intimidating non-profit organizations which do not toe the party line on reproductive issues, and denying USAID funds to overseas orgs which even mention abortion, or distribute condoms [wikipedia.org] as part of family planning efforts. (Imagine sending $15B to Africa to fight AIDS without distributing or even even mentioning condoms! Talk about throwing good money away...It's like fighting fires without water, it's that foolish.)

Sadly, I could document this sort of war on objective science all day, but I think I've made my point. It infests the policy debate over far more than global warming, and if you think there's no difference between the parties on this, you're sadly, tragically mistaken.

As if the Union of Concerned Scientists isn't infamous for perverting science for its own political ends itself. Real science that contradicts the Union of Concerned Scientists highly normative ideologically-based junk science? No, can't have that, people might begin to question the agenda, and more importantly, the funding, of "scientific" special interest groups.

The scientific community has reached the same conclusions as many so-called "envirowackos" regarding global warming. It's the politicians (mostly Republicans) who have turned the issue into a "debate." Somehow, those on the Right have managed to convince many people (yourself included) that there is a substantial debate within the scientific community, but that is simply not the case. Sure, there are fringe people who disagree with the mainstream, but any scientific theory has people on its fringe. The key

The reason the fringe exists is because people refuse to be swayed by proof. Try proving to some people that NASA really did send astronauts to the moon. To them, everything is staged, manipulated, or edited to show what The Man wants them to think.

You need to re-evaluate your understanding of science. Science proves nothing. Science is the process of creating models of natural (or even unnatural) phenomena, and empirically testing these models via experimentation. But no amount of experimentation will prove that a model is right. Experimentation can only show that a model is flawed, at which point a new model is proposed.

"The left wants a press that insists on facts, while the right wants an even presentation of partisan versions of reality

Generally, you're wrong. The left wants to hear what they already believe, no matter how fantastic. The right wants to hear what they already believe, no matter how fantanstic. Moderates want to hear both sides, often so that they can use the confusion as an excuse not to make a decision. Only the ignorant (I'm not being critical here) want to hear the truth (where it's well established

I wonder if we are going to see only one side, overly liberal people who believe whatever people say is science as long as they are saying the right and/or republicans are ignoring it, abusing it, etc etc.

Setting up a dichotomy (badly).

This is stupid, and does not belong on Slashdot at all.

Summing up his own post.

it will be a right/republican bashing contest. And sorry to say for all you super liberals here on Slashdot

Flamebaiting one side of the dichotomy and propping up the other as victims.

Someone proposes a competition for cartoons about political interference in science and then you complain "it will be a right/republican bashing contest."
Well if the Republicans were actually able to field someone who (1) knew some science and (2) was funny, then it wouldn't be quite so one sided would it?
Sheesh, next you'll be complaining that a competition to illustrate the shape of the earth is just a flat-earther bashing contest.

Given the fact that you posted it I have to presume that you are unaware of the fact that your post is a reasonably good example of why this contest is a good idea and the sponsoring organization is necessary.

Yes, you are right. (That was sarcasm)
If you take the time to read the sponsoring organization they are clearly promoting a liberal socialist agenda. One side, anti Bush, Anti republican, etc etc. The kind of organization they are would not let out cartoons critiquing their side.

If the present administration were a Democratic one and interfered with science the way the Bush administration has, then it'd make sense to hold a similar contest criticizing that administration's approach to science.

Don't like it when Republicans are criticized on science? Fine. Then get your Republican leaders not to downplay all climate research that doesn't reflect corporate interests, and not talk about evolution and "intelligent design" as though they were competing ideas of roughly comparable cred

Michael Crichton once again shows how focusing on local differences and exceptions and extrapolating them as a trend is an intellectual folly. If you want to seriously argue that the EPA budget-cutting, pro-mercury in the air, pro-arsenic in the water, pro-relaxation of pesticide rules Republicans that adamantly refuse to entertain the idea of ratifying Kyoto treaty are no different from the Democrats, then you're deliberately cherry-picking your facts to bolster your dellusional worldview -- you know, like Michael Crichton does.

Nixon was moderate to liberal on a number of domestic issues from wage controls to gun control to affirmative action to establishing the EPA, OSHA, and NOAA. He supported a lot of market regulation in a time period that pundits were saying that conservatism was dead. He was very different from many conservatives today, and many of his policies were great successes that were overshadowed by his personal corruption.

As for Johnson, he did open up a pristine area to drilling. However, he also said the following when signing the Clean Water Act:

"No one has the right to use America's rivers and
America's Waterways, that belong to all the people
as a sewer. The banks of a river may belong to one
man or one industry or one State, but the waters
which flow between the banks should belong to all
the people."

Johnson's record on the environment was overall quite good. His wife Lady Bird Johnson was a tireless environmental advocate. It was Johnson's administration that first started looking into the environment as a matter of air and water pollution instead of just protected land conservation. Nixon just kept the ball rolling that Johnson kicked off. From the Wikipedia, here is a list of environmental regulations kicked off in the Johnson era:

Clear Air, Water Quality and Clean Water Restoration Acts and Amendments

Wilderness Act of 1964

Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966

National Trail System Act of 1968

Wild and Scenic Rivers Act of 1968

Land and Water Conservation [Fund] Act of 1965

Solid Waste Disposal Act of 1965

Motor Vehicle Air Pollution Control Act of 1965

Aircraft Noise Abatement Act of 1968

To suggest that Johnson (and thus Democrats) are and were not environmentalists based on one single action against shows Crichton's lack of intellectual integrity.

Liberal Party of Australia is the conservative Australian party. It seems odd that some people don't understand that names don't prove anything. I guess this guy is why the Clear Skies, Healthy Forests, and No Child Left Behind got the names they did. How can you argue against a name?I suppose framing things as such helps. Renaming Creationism to Creation Science was probably a slick move. Hitler did just take over a small socialist party and had absolutly nothing to do with socialism (as anybody can tell b

Hitler took over a small party which started his rise to power, and this party had socialist elements in it. But nothing Nazis did after getting into power had anything to do with socialism.

Well, they were nationalists, or to be more specific, racists first, socialists a distant second. Note that their main opposition was the "Sozis", the socialists. Hitler did have, at least in rhetoric but also part in action, certain socialist elements but they were always limited to the "aryan race". But instead of the

But as the quote a few stories down, praising Michael Bloomberg for "It is impressive how he very directly demonizes those that would politicize stem cell research, global warming, Terry Schaivo, and evolution" demonstrates -- the lure of conflating them in order to reduce everything

But bring up the Nazi eugenics experiments--and bear in mind the eugenics is scientifically established--and they just mumble and walk away.

They do? That's news to me; I've never seen it happen. Is this common in your experience?

Besides, it only sounds to me like another reason to keep politics away from science. You're talking about not only an area of scientific inquiry but an approach to the actual practice of science that was mandated by the Nazis. If that's not a clearcut example of utterly unacc

Wow, you got me. I've fallen into the deep canyon of environmental responsibility. Please save me from my recycling bin and my daily walk to work through the park (or the bus on rainy days). Please open my eyes to the dangers of NOT polluting the air I breathe. Oh, what a fool I've been!

I think the point that he so ineloquently stated is that Al Gore and his followers are just as guilty of eco-extremism as Bush and his followers are as guilty of corporate-extremism. Just because Al Gore is blinded by his hatred for modern man and most Slashdotters are of his particular political party does not mean that he's absolutely correct. He's an extremist; but, at least I refuse to lump all environmentalists with his extremism.

On the opposite side, however, those of us who do NOT agree with Al Gore are automatically tagged as those who want to destroy the atmosphere in the name of the all-mighty dollar. It's completely hypocritical to despise when the right vilifies the extremist left but accept when the left vilifies the extremist right; yet that's what's most likely going to happen not only throughout this thread but also in this political cartoon contest.

Even though I'm a staunch, evil Republican, I'm also a staunch conservationist. I do not accept the extremist, global warming theories that Al Gore and the majority of Slashdotters take as gospel. Even so, I make sure to recycle everything from plastic to office paper, newspapers, and cardboard; I make sure to keep my car properly tuned and maintained to maximize my fuel efficiency; I complain to corporations who make products that can be recycled but aren't, such as the Brita water filters; but I guarantee that I will be lumped in with the anti-environmentalist crowd because of my political affiliation and because I think that Al Gore is a freakin' nutcase with too much time on his hands and too much exporsure to abuse.

That's the problem with Slashdot and topics that intermingle politics with science. Anyone with any inclination to doubt the extremist beliefs of people like Al Gore and TripMaster Monkey is automatically tagged as anti-environment, which is complete BS, just like anyone who says that we need to lower pollution and sign Kyoto (which I am fervently against because of the way it singles out the U.S.) is suddenly tagged as a tree hugger.

And to prove that even further, I guarantee that I'll be modded as troll or flamebait, even though there are thousands if not tens of thousands of posts in Slashdot's archive to prove this. After all, anyone who dares to challenge the Slashdot groupthink is vilified because that's an acceptable practice, although the opposite is not. So be it.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to take my over-flowing, recycling bin out for collection tomorrow and take several bags of shredded office paper down to my township's collection facility. Yessir, just another evil, Republican doing his part to further ruin the environment.

Global warming is not an extremist theory, it is a fact, unless you want to argue with decades of climate data. While it is still hotly debated whether this is because of CO2 emissions, natural cycles, volcanoes, sunspots, or whatever - it doesn't change the fact that the Earth's climate is changing.

The Earth's climate is always changing. We have been in a warming trend since the peek of the Little Ice Age.That's not news, at least to those who pay attention to such things. Unfortunately, the rhetoric has

Global warming went up the most during the time Gore was in power, according to Gore's own charts. He also flies around the country in a jet to give his lectures, polluting more air than most people do driving a car for a year.The most damning contradiction is that the global temperature record shows that worldwide average temperatures have not risen since 1998.

By the way, please do not use your recycling bin. It is more damaging to the environment to recycle paper in those dirty refineries then it is to

I might be willing to buy the bit about recycling paper being bad for the environment with some evidence to back it up, but there are a couple of points you made that are invalid or misleading.1. Gore was never "in power". Bill Clinton was President and he took more input from his wife than from Gore. You could criticize Gore for not asserting himself more, but very few VPs before Cheney have, that I am aware of (I'm young, Dan Quayle's my major point of reference here).